


Don't be Mad

by ElsieMcClay



Series: Voltron Fics [21]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Delirium, Gen, Sick Lance (Voltron), lance is sick, voltron sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-05
Updated: 2017-11-05
Packaged: 2019-01-29 21:34:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12639603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElsieMcClay/pseuds/ElsieMcClay
Summary: Lance thinks everyone is mad at him.





	Don't be Mad

Self-esteem is proven to drop in the early stages of puberty. Lance started puberty pretty early, maybe when he was about ten or eleven. Since then, he’d been having these terrible thoughts about himself and everything that everyone thought about him. He started going to therapy when he was fifteen in an attempt to get better in order to be accepted into the Garrison. 

His therapist wasn’t a good one in the slightest. He’d told Lance to just tell himself a lie about himself until even he forgot it wasn’t the truth. He told Lance that what he thought now was the truth, but the truth can be manipulated. It never made Lance feel much better, and his confidence continued to drop. Somehow, though, he managed to scrape past the psychiatric evaluation and get into the Garrison.

Lance still doesn’t believe the lies he’s telling himself. He wonders how long it takes to forget something you’ve known for nearly a decade. He wishes it would hurry up and just let him forget about how stupid he is and how no one likes him and–

No. Stop.

Lance closes his eyes and clamps his hands over his ears like that will make it stop. It doesn’t work. He lets out a strangled groan and pulls his jacket tighter around himself. He figures he must resemble something just short of a zombie in his shaky, groaning state. After training, he’d been far too tired to change from his flight suit, so all he did was slip off his armour pieces and replace them with his jacket. It was a lot more comfortable than being in his jean, which were normally stiff from the cold of the castle. He found early on that the castle had a limited heating regulation system. 

That’s the only reason he didn’t find it weird that he woke up shivering under the blankets on his bed. He woke up like that a lot, but the fact that he was still shivering while also sweating during training? Oh boy, from that point on, he knew it was going to be a tough day. 

For a long while, Lance debates on telling the team. What if they’re disappointed in him? What if they simply don’t care? What if they already know and that’s why they’re talking so much louder? 

His head is pounding, and the shouting of Keith and Shiro certainly isn’t helping. He wishes he could tell them to quiet down a little, but he knows that neither of them like being told to do very much. He’s pulled the short straw and had to be on the receiving end of the “I’m in charge, so shut up, Lance” speech more than once. He’s glad it him rather than Pidge and Hunk because he knows both of them would get upset and show it and everyone would be tense. Lance gets upset, yeah, but he’s had more than enough occasions where he’s had to hide his feelings, so he’s practically a pro at it. Plus, he feels like he deserves it sometimes. 

Finally, training ends, and Lance no longer sees any reason at all to tell the team. He supposes, with a little rest, he’ll be back and ready to take the lectures again. Right now, he is definitely not ready for any lectures, and he hopes that his team will just let him be and not be mad at him for whatever he did this time. 

“Hey, Lance,” Hunk cheers, and Lance refrains from wincing painfully. He smiles weakly and waves down the hall at his friend. Hunk walks off, and Lance thinks of how angry he must be that Lance didn’t stop to talk to him. He feels…guilty, but he’s so, very tired. 

“Lance?” Lance groans internally. He finally made it to the couch and curled up, exhausted, but Keith is trying to talk to him, and he doesn’t want him to be mad like everyone else is.

“Mmm,” he grunts, rolling over and squinting up at Keith. Keith looks down at him, his eyebrows scrunched together in worry. “You mad at me, too?”

“What? Why would I be mad?” Lance shrugs half-heartedly.

“E’ryone’s always mad at me. Can’t take a lecture righ’ now, sorry.” Lance’s eyes fall shut, and he sucks in a rattling breath. He coughs into the couch before Keith realizes the problem. His chest tightens, and he bends to Lance’s height on the couch. 

“You’re on fire,” he gasps as he places his palm on Lance’s sweaty forehead. 

“I’m on the couch, Keith. What’re you talkin’ abou’?” Lance slurs, but Keith isn’t listening. 

“I’ll go find Shiro or Allura or Coran or someone,” he breathes before sprinting down the hall, but Lance doesn’t listen to the full sentence, impaired by the spottiness of his hearing and focus. He takes it as Keith telling him to find someone before storming off, and he plans to do just that. It’s easier to listen than to disobey Keith and put him in a mood. Lance learned that early on, too. 

“Lance?”

“Hey, ‘Lurra. Was lookin’ for you. Dunno why, Keith never told me why,” Lance mumbles. Allura furrows her brows and crosses her arms. 

“Lance, why are you not doing something better with your time? Perhaps training would benefit you more than wasting the time of both of us.” Lance nods, tears in his eyes.

“Yeah, I’ll get right on that, sorry,” he promises tearfully. He hurries away, not noticing how Allura seems to regret her words. He’s gone before she can ask him if he’s okay, so she figures he is. Allura continues on her way to the bridge. 

Okay, Keith might panic a little (read: a lot) when he comes back with Shiro and can’t find Lance on the couch or in any of the nearby halls and rooms. Shiro looks worried, too, and for good reason. It’s not very often Keith comes knocking on his door, nearly incoherent as he yells about Lance having an extremely high fever. 

They pass by Allura, not stopping to ask her if she’s seen him. He’s not with Blue, Red, Hunk, Pidge, Coran, or his room. Keith tugs at his hair, on the verge of crying. 

“C’mon, Keith. Where haven’t we checked?” Keith runs through all the rooms in the castle before stiffening. 

“The training deck.” Shiro’s eyes widen, and they’re both running across the castle, sliding to a stop in front of the training room. The moment the door slides open, they hear Lance grunt and hit the wall, the robotic clunk of the training bot’s joints echoing around the room. 

“End training sequence,” Shiro calls, and the bot freezes with its foot just above Lance’s shaking form. His breathing is even more labored than before, and he’s dripping in sweat. “Lance, what are you doing? You’re sick,” Shiro chastises. Lance shrinks under his words, and Keith pulls him into a sitting position.

“‘Lurra got mad ‘cause I wasn’t doin’ anything, ‘n now you’re mad ‘cause I was doing somethin’,” Lance sobs deliriously. He moans in pain and curls into himself, and Shiro’s disapproving gaze softens.

“No, no, Lance. Shiro’s not mad, and Allura isn’t either,” Keith tells him, smoothing back his hair. He thinks back to Lance’s miserable “Everyone’s always mad at me” from when he was on the couch, and he wonders how Lance went so long feeling that way. He wonders if by “everyone”, he means the team or something much more than that.

“Really?” Keith’s heart breaks, and he notices Shiro having the same broken expression. The desperation in Lance’s tone makes him seem like a child in need of a friend. 

“Really.”


End file.
